Photo credit: AFP

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger was delighted by his team’s 2-0 victory at Everton and believes it proves that they still have the ability to win the Premier League.

The north London club’s season hit the skids this week as losses to Watford and Barcelona saw Wenger’s men dumped out of the FA Cup and Champions League respectively.

Their league form has also been indifferent since the turn of the year and they have fallen behind pace-setters Leicester City and Tottenham Hotspur in the race for the title.

However, Saturday’s performance at Everton may prove to have an invigorating effect as first-half goals from Danny Welbeck and 19-year-old Alex Iwobi were enough for them to cruise past an abject home side.

Both goals were typical of Arsenal -– a mixture of pace, intelligent passing and vision -– and Wenger was thrilled to see his side make such an impression at Goodison Park.

“I am not masochistic enough to consider us out of the race,” said the Frenchman, whose side remain 11 points adrift of leaders Leicester.

“Mathematically we have a chance and a game in hand at home. We are not the flavor of the week, but if we don’t believe, no-one will do it for us.

“We have to be humble and fight in every game like today (Saturday). Then we never know. We need some performances and some (other sides to drop points).”

Welbeck rounded Joel Robles for the opener on seven minutes before Iwobi added a second just before the break, sprinting through on goal and calmly slotting home from Hector Bellerin’s ball over the top.

Arsenal more than deserved their 2-0 half-time advantage and Everton did little after the re-start to provide evidence that they could snatch a draw.

– ‘Too pedestrian’ –

The visitors’ professional approach to safeguarding victory impressed Wenger and he reserved special praise for Iwobi, the academy graduate, who crowned an impressive all-round showing with his first senior goal.

“He is an intelligent boy who loves football,” said Wenger of the Nigeria international. “He is very passionate about the game, keen to learn and very humble as well.

“He has been at our club since the age of eight. I took him in pre-season and I liked what he did. After that he improved very quickly and he’s done very well.”

Everton’s season is well and truly in the doldrums after an eighth home defeat of the league campaign.

They have won just four league matches at Goodison all season and although they are in the FA Cup semi-finals, any hopes of European qualification via the league have long since passed.

They were booed off at the end of this contest and manager Roberto Martinez knows that he has his work cut out to ensure the remaining months of Everton’s league campaign do not see them slip further down the table.

“Today was a one-off,” Martinez said. “I don’t think we were ourselves in any part of the game.

“We were too pedestrian and we allowed Arsenal to have too much movement. Arsenal looked fresher and had a clearer intent to win the game.

“I don’t think we had any period where we looked ourselves. We were very, very slow with our build-up and we had no clarity in our defensive play.

“It’s a real disappointment because we know the quality that we have. We were second in every action and Arsenal were better than us.”